Patrick Kennedy invokes 'incredible name'

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Patrick Kennedy is under no illusions about why, at the astonishingly
tender age of 32, he's been put in charge of the Democratic campaign to win back the House
of Representatives.

The Kennedy file

Age: 32 (born July 14, 1967, Brighton, Mass.).

Education: Providence College, B.A., 1991.

Political career: Rhode Island House of
Representatives, 1988-94; U.S. House of Representatives, 1994-present. Appointed by House
Minority Leader Dick Gephardt to head the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in
1998.

What he thinks about Tom Davis: "I like him a great deal. He's friends with my Aunt
Ethel and my cousins. He's a good guy. I think he's a moderate in a lot of respects."

To the inevitable criticisms that he got the job less because of his ability than his
famous family, the son of Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., has developed a disarmingly shrewd
response: He makes his guilty plea part of his campaign pitch.

"It's an incredible name," the Rhode Island congressman says in a rare
relaxed moment between campaign stops. "I know I had nothing to do with making it
what it is today, but I also recognize I can transmit the power of the name to accomplish
goals my uncles would have supported."

Kennedy isn't shy about invoking those uncles, President John Kennedy and Sen. Robert
Kennedy, as he travels the country for Democratic congressional candidates.

"If you care about President Kennedy, if you cared about Bobby, if you cared about
anything they fought for, you'll care about this election," he tells a crowd at a
community center here . The 'Camelot' torch.

While many commentators mourned the fatal air crash of John F. Kennedy Jr. last summer
as "the end of Camelot," this lesser-known cousin has been carrying the torch
from one end of the country to the other. With little fanfare, he has become one of the
more politically successful Kennedys of his generation.

He's got the same lean, beaky face and barely contained thatch of gingery hair as his
uncle Robert. Along with the looks, he's inherited his family's unabashedly liberal credo.

On a recent weekend campaign swing that takes him from Columbus' meaner streets to a
tony stretch of Florida's Gold Coast, he blasts Republicans as "immoral" for
opposing an increase in the minimum wage, savages insurance companies -- "they're not
in it to take care of people" -- and plugs a health-care bill sponsored by "my
father" and Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga.

Patrick Kenedy was less than a year old when the second of the Kennedy brothers to be
assassinated, Robert, was gunned down while campaigning for president. There's something
poignant about the thrill he gets from meeting people who tell him they knew his father's
brothers. "When I was growing up, all I did was read about my uncles," Kennedy
says. "They were people in the history books."

Kennedy's passionate views and youthful impulsiveness sometimes get him in trouble. At
an appearance with National Republican Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Tom Davis
before the National Association of Manufacturers last fall, he created palpable discomfort
in the relatively conservative audience when he savaged House Republican leaders as
"conservative cowboys" and their impeachment trial of President Clinton as
"inexcusable."

An even more glaring gaffe came last year when Kennedy told a reporter that Democrats
had written off the votes of rural, gun-owning conservatives. Party strategists routinely
acknowledge as much in private, but Kennedy's public candor gave the Republicans an
opportunity to make political hay, and they did.

In more recent months, Kennedy has become better at modulating his political voice. He
jokes with a reporter about his "great soak-the-rich speech" in Columbus, but he
doesn't deliver an encore when he arrives at Palm Beach.

Kennedy views the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) fundraisers as the
most important aspect of his job. For all his earnest idealism, he's kept his focus on the
bottom line. The results have been record-breaking: The $33.4 million the DCCC raked in
last year was almost as much as the committee raised during the previous two years. A fundraising
dinner in Washington last week pulled in $7.3 million -- more than double the previous
year's dinner.

"Raising money is my primary goal," Kennedy says. "I feel uniquely
positioned because of my family name to reach out to these people."

Beyond expectations

House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, who mentored Kennedy and then entrusted him with a
campaign that could decide whether the Missouri lawmaker, a 23-year veteran of the House,
becomes its speaker, doesn't buy the self-deprecation.

To hear him tell it, no one had lower expectations than Kennedy himself. A severely
asthmatic child in a family of famously rough-and-tumble touch football players, he grew
up seeing himself as a mere supporting actor in the family saga. Kennedy says he initially
thought his role in politics would be behind-the-scenes. "I was looking forward to
helping my brother Teddy," he says.

But his older sibling opted for a private life. Patrick moved to Rhode Island and was
elected to the state Legislature. His family helped him get elected, but he credits his
colleagues in the Statehouse with "building my self-esteem" and persuading him
to run for Congress.

A bold move

Kennedy has been open about the adolescent experimentation with drugs that landed him
in a rehabilitation center. Last month, he surprised his protective aides by publicly
disclosing that he has been treated for depression since he was a teenager and is still
taking medication and undergoing therapy.

It was an unusually bold move, according to Mike Faenza, president of the National
Mental Health Association. "People thought it was just wonderful he would step
forward," Faenza says. "I think coming out and letting Americans know that it is
possible to be extremely productive when you're actually in treatment is very
powerful."

Last year, Kennedy resisted a not-so-subtle effort by his father to get him into a race
for Senate after Sen. John Chafee, R-R.I., announced his retirement.

"That would have been one for the history books," says Kennedy, who would
have been the first son to serve with his father in the Senate had he been elected. The
three-term congressman decided it would be better to bide his time.

"I'm obviously hypersensitive to the suspicion that people have that I'm a young
man in a hurry, that I don't have my feet firmly on the ground," Kennedy says.

Kennedy insists he hasn't given up anything. The white-hot race to win back the House
has the Kennedy competitive juices in full flow. And it's given him a sense of connection
with the uncles he never knew.

"I'm, like, in awe of the fact that I get to carry this legacy," Kennedy
says. "I couldn't think of a place where I could put my good name to better
use."